Ankara, Baghdad and Riyadh ask: Are US air strikes working?

October 11, 2014

Oct 11: The ISIS, plaguing many countries in West Asia, made a symbolic assertion during Haj too. At the ritual stoning of the devil at Mina, five kilometres to the East of Mecca, fluttered a black banner of the Islamic State (IS). The police said nothing.

US Air StrikeRecently, The Independent in London published an article giving a clue to ordinary Saudi reaction to IS. Patrick Cockburn, the writer, has cited a study done by Fouad Khadem of the Centre of Academic Shia Studies in London.

Public discussions on sensitive issues are not permitted in Saudi Arabia. Tweeting therefore has become a common vehicle to sustain debates.

The messages Saudis have been sharing on the Islamic State are fascinating.

When IS swept through northern Iraq and eastern Syria, Mania bin Nasir al-Mani was pleased. "The great land of Allah belongs neither to Kings nor nations. Those who deserve the Caliphate are those who implement the Sharia of Allah on earth and on people. Apostates and traitors deserve nothing but the sword." Later, al Mani joined the IS in Syria.

One Azfar Minfard declared: "No need for IS to enter - our country is full of them (IS)." Fata al Arab was more emphatic: "IS is on the Saudi borders, and its supporters inside Saudi Arabia are more than its organized members and armed fighters."

A revealing tweet came from Adil al-Kalbany, a Wahabi Shaikh, who has for years led prayers as an Imam of the Holy Shrine in Mecca. "IS is a Salafi (fundamentalist) offshoot - a reality we should confront with transparency."

As soon as President Barack Obama announced the coalition of the willing to wage war against IS, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar, the UAE and Jordan instantly signed up. The next country had to seek permission from parliament before it joined - Great Britain, but only to bomb IS in Iraq. Strange, isn't it?

The tardiness with which the coalition of willing nations is being erected contrasts sharply with the speed with which non-state actors have come together as ISIS - a hodge-podge of Islamists, ex-Baathists

turned-deeply religious in their marginalized distress, Naqshbandi Sufis, Muslim Brothers, Salafists, Al Qaeda, Jabat al Nusra, everyone without exception opposed to Islamic monarchies.

One would have thought that Morocco is not prominent in the coalition of the willing because Rabat considers itself remote from the IS theatre. The monarchy woke up with a start the other morning when its security forces, in a coordinated action with Spain, busted an IS recruitment cell.

While the cumulative power of all the elements in the IS are focussed on monarchies, principally Saudi Arabia, elements in the IS have independent scores to settle with regimes in Baghdad, Ankara and sub-groups fighting the central authority in these states.

The IS, which mutated from the civil war in Syria, first identified groups seething with local anger. The famous occupation of Mosul, which boosted the prestige of the IS as a formidable force, would not have been possible without painstaking groundwork.

Abu Bakr al Baghdadi was able to find an ally at the highest echelons of the Nineveh province. Mosul is its capital. The Governor, Atheel Nujaifi, handed over the keys of Mosul to al Baghdadi, an act of splendid treachery. He arranged for a most orderly takeover of Mosul by the Caliphate.

Nujaifi had longstanding grievances. He had for years been trying to carve out Mosul as a Sunni dominated city surrounded by Kurds including 350,000 of a minority tribe called the Yazidis.

Mosul and Erbil happen to be just a little north of the 36th parallel beyond which Western Forces had established a security zone after the first Gulf war to encourage Kurdish refugees to return to Iraq.

This exactly is what Nujaifi was seething with rage about. He handed over the battle to the IS. This one move created turbulence in the Kurdish north of Iraq which the Americans had tranquilized with a No Fly Zone during Saddam's rule.

The alacrity with which Obama announced air strikes against the IS was to protect assets in Kurdish Iraq where Israelis, Turks and Americans have been doing reasonable business in recent decades. The swiftness with which the Gulf Sheikhs lined up dictated the next American priority.

Saudi Arabia had to be protected. Without a strong Saudi Arabia in the region, Israel would be a lonesome presence. That is why the US is talking of "decades" long presence in the region. Whatever else the IS may do they must not lurch towards Saudi Arabia. The US will stand at the gate like supreme bouncers. But an extended US stay will create the inevitable political backlash - exponential anti-Americanism.

Shias from Mosul clambered on to their cars and trucks and drove 450 km to Karbala and Najaf. Between these two pilgrim centres, the 120-km route is lined by big halls as halting stations for pilgrims. These are tearing at the seams with Shia refugees who do not know where to turn for help since there is very little government on view in Baghdad. The "all inclusive" government of Haider al Abadi is, on the face of it, not governing.

Meanwhile, Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey is scripting his own tragedy of indecision, rather like the Prince of Denmark. Everyone in the region, without exception, is keeping one's fingers crossed.

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Agencies
August 5,2020

Ninety per cent of a sample group of coronavirus-recovered patients from a prominent hospital in China's Wuhan city where the pandemic broke out have reported lung damage and five per cent of them are again in quarantine after testing positive for the virus, according to a media report on Wednesday.

A team at the Zhongnan Hospital of Wuhan University led by Peng Zhiyong, director of the hospital's Intensive Care Unit, has been conducting follow-up visits with '100 recovered patients' since April.

The first phase of this one-year programme finished in July. The average age of the patients in the study is 59.

According to the first phase results, 90 per cent of the patients' lungs are still in a damaged state, which means their lungs ventilation and gas exchange functions have not recovered to the level of healthy people, state-run Global Times reported.

Peng's team conducted a six-minute walking test with the patients. They found that the recovered patients could only walk 400 metres in six minutes while their healthy peers could walk 500 metres in the same period.

Some recovered patients have to rely on oxygen machines even three months after being discharged from the hospital, Liang Tengxiao, a doctor from the Dongzhimen Hospital, Beijing University of Chinese Medicine, was quoted as saying by the report.

Liang's team is also conducting follow-up visits with recovered patients aged above 65.

The results also showed that antibodies against the novel coronavirus in 10 per cent of the 100 patients have disappeared.

Five per cent of them received negative results in Covid-19 nucleic acid tests but positive results in Immunoglobulin M (IgM) tests, and thus have to be quarantined again, the report said.

IgM is usually the first antibody produced by the immune system when a virus attacks. A positive result in an IgM test usually means that a person has just been infected by the virus.

It is still unclear if this means these people have been infected again.

The 100 patients' immune systems have not fully recovered as they showed a low level of B cells -- - a primary force for killing viruses in the human body -- but a high level of T cells which only recognise viral antigens outside infected cells.

"The results revealed that the patients’ immune systems are still recovering," Peng said.

The patients also suffered from depression and a sense of stigma. Most of the recovered patients told the team that their families were not willing to have dinner with them at the same table, the report said.

Less than half of the recovered patients have returned to work, it said.

The findings are significant as the coronavirus first emerged in Wuhan city.

Hubei province for which Wuhan is the provincial capital has reported a total of 68,138 confirmed Covid-19 cases till now. The disease has claimed 4,512 lives in the province, according to the official data.

China reported 27 new confirmed Covid-19 cases on Tuesday, including 22 locally-transmitted cases, the National Health Commission (NHC) said on Wednesday.

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News Network
February 18,2020

Washington, Feb 18: The upcoming visit of President Donald Trump to India later this month has the potential to usher in a new era of bilateral ties between the two countries, a top American business advocacy group has said.

President Trump will pay a state visit to India on February 24 and 25 at the invitation of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. He would be accompanied by First Lady Melania Trump.

This would be the president's first bilateral visit in the third decade of the 21st century and also the first after his acquittal by the Senate in the impeachment trial.

"I believe President Trump's upcoming visit to India has the potential to usher in a new era of our bilateral ties," Mukesh Aghi, President of the US India Strategic and Partnership Forum (USISPF) said in a statement on Monday.

On the sidelines of the visit, the USISPF, in collaboration with the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI) and the ORF, has announced to organise a program entitled "US-India Forum: Partners for Growth".

The full-day discussion will focus on the key pillars defining India and the US' strategic, economic, and cultural partnership over the next decade.

"We have an opportunity before us to make real progress on multiple aspects of the relationship— whether it is upholding peace and security in the Indo-Pacific region; building upon an already strong energy partnership; developing co-production and co-development opportunities in the defense space; or strengthening bilateral trade," Aghi said.

"We look forward to an extremely successful visit and some concrete outcomes from the visit," he said.

The day-long programme on February 25 in New Delhi, will bring together over 500 senior business executives, members of the US-India think tank community and leading figures of the Indian diaspora to set the agenda for this strategic partnership.

Discussions during the day will touch upon areas, including the Indo-Pacific Strategy and Maritime Security; the US-India Defence Partnership, the US-India Energy Partnership, Elevating US-India Trade and Investment and Role of the Indian Diaspora in US-India Relations.

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News Network
July 23,2020

Minneapolis, Jul 23: The former Minneapolis police officer charged with murder in the death of George Floyd was charged Wednesday with multiple felony counts of tax evasion.

Derek Chauvin and his wife, Kellie May Chauvin, were each charged in Washington County with six counts of filing false or fraudulent tax returns for the tax years 2014 through 2019 and three counts of failing to file tax returns for 2016, 2017 and 2018.

Floyd, a Black man who was handcuffed, died May 25 after Chauvin, who is white, pressed his knee against Floyd's neck for nearly eight minutes as Floyd pleaded for air.

Chauvin is charged with second-degree murder, third-degree murder and manslaughter. He and three other officers who were at the scene were fired.

Chauvin is in custody on the charges in the Floyd case. Kellie Chauvin, who filed for divorce after Floyd's death, is not in custody.

Online court records didn't list attorneys for either in the tax evasion case, and calls to Kellie Chauvin did not go through.

Washington County Attorney Pete Orput said the investigation into the Chauvins was started in June by the Minnesota Department of Revenue and Oakdale Police Department.

Authorities allege in the criminal complaints that the Chauvins failed to file income tax returns and pay state income taxes, and that they underreported and underpaid taxes on income they earned from various jobs each year.

The complaints allege that they also failed to pay proper sales tax on a $100,000 BMW purchased in Minnesota in 2018.

Prosecutors say the Chauvins bought the car in Minnetonka but registered it in Florida, where they paid lower sales taxes.

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